Best Of 2021: Start Your Year Right

Wherever we find you in the world, my friend, I wish you Happy New Year. My whole focus with you is a forward focus from your best possible place. Because I really feel like starting the new year, the greatest thing that you can possibly do is start this new year out on a generous foot to sort of up the level of generosity in your life to other people. You know, I really feel like that that spirit comes along with the Christmas or the holiday seasons. And then when we enter New Year's, people are really excited because a lot of that generous spirit is there. They got some gifts, they got to give some things, and this good energy is there, and I hope that you'll keep that. Some people lose it when it gets into February and March because they stop being as generous as they were in December. And I don't know about you, but I feel like the whole world could use a big dose of generosity right now. I want you to approach the first 10 days of this year every morning just saying, what if this was my next level day? How would this day go if this was going to be my next level? Next time you go out with your honey, your spouse, your partner, your significant other, if you're dating somebody and you go out and you sit down with them, ask yourself, or, okay, if this was gonna be a next level date, what would I do? What would I bring to it? How could I take to the next level? Cause when you ask those questions, awesome things always happen. But today I thought I'd start with how I set my goals. Just last night with my wife, and, you know, usually together we sit down, we talk about the next year upcoming, and that's always really great. And she has the approach of like lists, right? She makes a long list, and I do that too. But then what I do with mine is I group them so that I can create themes, okay? So that, you know, if you're ever gonna do something and it's a complex project, you create a theme, right? Let me give you an example. Have you ever thrown a big party before? I bet if you threw a big party, you picked a theme for that party, right? Let's say you. Let's say maybe when you got married, you chose a party theme, right? You said, okay, that theme is going to incorporate these feelings, these sights, these sounds, this look, right? It's like when you design your house, right? You create a theme for that house. Is it modern?

Is it farmhouse?

Is it. I don't any of kinds of houses because that's what we own. So. But you create a theme to Manage complexity. Write that down. Create themes to manage complexity. It will help you so much. Right? So think about you're going to throw a big, you know, a big wedding for somebody. Well, you know, I went to one wedding one time, and at that wedding, I mean, how complex everything is at a wedding. You know, you got to pick everything from, you know, from the tablecloths to the forks to the napkins to the flowers, to just, you know, even the theme of the pictures that you're taking. It's complex. I remember going to one and it was my buddy Steve. He threw a great wedding. He and his wife threw an amazing, amazing wedding. And it was a 1920s themed party. And because they had a theme and everyone knew it, their wedding planner knew it, the mother in laws knew it, the father in laws knew it. Us best men, we knew it. When everyone knows the theme, it's easier to coordinate. Everybody.

Does that make sense?

It's the same way when you're in corporate America that all CEOs, especially if I work with them, but in general, I'd say it's a pretty common thing in the corporate culture that when a CEO sets the big vision for the new year or for the next quarter or for the next calendar year, they almost always pick three strategic initiatives. Not five, not 10. Almost always three. Why do you think that is? Well, one, the rule of three or the power of three, that three things are easier to remember than five, three are easier to remember than 10. So just simplicity. But also that by having just three, everybody remembers them and everyone can rally around making those three things happen. It's one of the most important things you do when you work with leaders of bigger teams, is starting helping them make sure that the teams know the themes or the initiatives to which they're working with. Right. Very, very key. So often a CEO will pick a strategic initiative and then on that strategic initiative, they'll create a slogan or a.

Tagline or a code word.

It's very popular in Silicon Valley to have like Sprint weeks or Code a thons. And they'll have themes. They'll name what they're doing for the next 12 weeks. And then that name becomes something everyone rallies around and does. It just simplifies complexity to have a theme. You follow me so far trying to give you a lot of examples. So you wrote down a big list of goals. Were there any themes in those goals? When you think about your New Year's resolutions, were there any themes in your goals? So what you might do here today, since we're here Together. If you don't already have a journal with all your New Year's resolutions written down, maybe you start there. But if you don't have that, that's okay. We'll guide you through a process. But if you have all those New Year's resolutions already done, which I assume most of you have, then what are the themes that are popping out to you? So let me share with you some of mine and maybe encourage you to adopt some of these in your own life where it's appropriate. Okay, I've got different themes, and within each theme is some different things that I'm working on. So as an example, one of the main themes for me is this theme that this is going to be what I call a build year. Okay, a build year. What does that mean? That means in lots of different areas of my life, I'm looking to build this year, right? Other years it's just like optimize. Other years it's just start, right? It's kind of how it goes, kind of start, operationalize, optimize, and then build scale, right? That's usually the business progression of people's lives. I don't know where you're at. Are you at start? Are you at operationalizing like you started, but now you're really figuring out what really works and making sure you have systems and processes in place for that? Optimization is you already got the systems processes in place and now you're just figuring out what really moves the needle and you're just dialing things in, right? And the next thing is once you kind of have that, you know how to build from there. And that's kind of the nature of business, but I think it's the nature of our life sometimes too, right? You start a new habit, you figure out how it works, you dial it in and optimize it, you add a bunch more on top of it that make it more complex or more sort of results driven. Okay, you all follow with me so far. So this is mine build. And it applies to a bunch of different areas of my life. My first theme is a build theme. That means for me in different areas of life too. For example, one area for me that I'm working on is strength and mobility. I want to build more strength and mobility in my physical body, right? That's important for me. This last year, you know, ever since 2011, some of you guys know I had my ATV accident in 2011, and that was the year I got the big brain injury that I'm always talking about on stage. And you know, that Brain injury really caused an unbelievable amount of difficulty mentally, emotionally, physically. From 2011 to pretty much 2014. It was a tough three year period for me and my wife and it was just challenging. And while I physically healed from a broken wrist and, you know, a thrown out hip and dislocated shoulder and just a mess, you know, broken up ribs, I was pretty messed up. But it was the mental part of things that was challenging because the brain injury. And so I learned a lot about my body during that time because there were a lot of things I couldn't do as I was healing. And then I dialed it in to a place that I was happy with. And so I don't know how you're thinking about your year and maybe that's not an issue for you. For some other people, they're just like, well, Brandon, I don't want to build anything. I want to lose some weight, you know, And I say, okay, great, that's okay. But the reason I'm sharing my goal as we're going to go through this today, because I'm going to challenge you in certain areas of your life. And the first area I'm going to challenge you in is your health arena, the arena of your health. So your self care. Now, I know inevitably you have some New Year's resolutions written about your health right now. The question is, how are you going to accomplish them? Today, as we move through a couple different frameworks, I'm going to show you how to break down your big New Year's goals into very manageable daily, weekly, monthly approaches. Like, I really want you to feel like you've got a handle on how you're going to do things moving forward. But I also want you to get just a fire in your belly about your self care and your health this year. I can't tell you even some of the most extraordinary people I've ever met in this arena of health, like Olympians or very high level athletes or, or people who just, you know, you just look at them and you just know they've got their stuff together. They're always talking about that big bike ride they took or that great, great hiking or camping trip with their family. They're out and about, they're staying healthy. I saw a lot of them because of the emotional weight of all the negativity in the zeitgeist, at least here, specifically in Northern America, you know, with our politics, with a lot of the social media stuff going on. A lot of people, they compromised their health because they didn't have their emotional or Mental life in play. And you're going to see how all these things ultimately tie together. That I really believe that no matter what your themes are for life, that somewhere in the middle here is going to be like, something in here. It's going to be like a joyous feeling. You know, it's going to be something where you feel like, oh, wow, I feel positive, I feel happy. You know, this star in here is going to be emotions. Now, I know it's going to get ugly as I start drawing this out, but I want you to be thinking about whatever goal you set. You've got to determine the feelings you're after to achieve it.

Does that make sense?

If you haven't read high performance habits yet, it's one of the central things that I learned from high performers is they determine the feeling that they need to have to achieve something in advance of it. Most people are thinking the opposite way. They think, okay, when I have strength and mobility, I'll be happy. Or you think, when I achieve my New Year's goal, I'll be happy, I'll be at peace, I'll be joyous. But it actually works a different way. Okay, you don't get happiness by doing something. You bring happiness to something and you have higher odds of achieving it.

Does that make sense?

So if you wrote down goals for your New Year resolutions, what were the emotions or the feelings that would help you attain those goals faster?

Does that make sense?

If you wrote down a list of goals, what emotions or feelings would help you achieve those goals faster? I'm always aware of the emotions I have to bring to a situation. I'm always aware of the feeling that I'm trying to create. I'm always aware of the thoughts I need to have prior to the action. And I know you know all that, but how many times have you sat down to work on your computer and you just sat down from a blank state? I mean, meaning literally, you got your coffee, maybe you sat down, you just started working, but you didn't first prime your mind, your emotions, your body to be able to work well.

Does that make sense?

So whatever the goal is or whatever the task or the activity is, job number one is to identify the emotion, the feelings or the thoughts that would go into making that better.

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Here's what a lot of people have done. They made a big mistake, big mistake in setting their New Year's resolutions. And I want you to really listen to this because if, if you got this one thing from this right now, I know I'll change your life for the rest of your life. And I know that's a big promise. So tune in. Most people really mess up because they only set New Year's resolutions and goals for themselves. Did you set any goals for your team, for your spouse, for your daughter, for your brother? For the top five people who are in your circle of influence, did you set goals for them? I don't mean you called them up.

And said, honey, I got a goal for you.

I really need you to work on this. That's not what I'm talking about. I'm setting for you to have a goal for them, to want something and desire something for them, and you're going to help them achieve it. That's when you know you're a high performer. So for those who already set the goals for your Families. You already set goals for your teams or your careers. You already know how you want to develop each person in your circle of influence. You already know how you want to inspire or guide the people around you. Good job. If you didn't do that and you do that today, we will change your year. So many people got myopic. They got very, very myopic. What do I mean? They got very narrow about their circle of life. Even though we have Facebook and Instagram and so many ways to connect with people around the world, a lot of people went completely inside because they were protecting. Right? There was so much noise and negativity out there that a lot of people started protecting. And when we protect, our whole mind, our whole body, our whole physiology is set up to narrow. And so they took a narrow view of life. But the odds are the only thing that pulls you out of survival is generosity, not selfishness. Service, not selfishness. And so as you go to set your New Year's goals, have you thought about what is the goal that you want for other people and how can you help them get there? It doesn't mean that you have to have a big, long conversation with everybody you influence that you go around. Like, I haven't had conversations with lots of people in my life about it, but I know the goal. I know that when I'm working with this person, this is the goal I have in mind for them and their life. And it's not me kind of trying to, like, dictate what they should do or not. It's not like that. It's that, you know, we're goal oriented people. Like, as you know, if you went out with your spouse or significant other to dinner and you sat down and you said, you know, you just went into dinner with no intention, dinner could be good. But if you made it a goal, you said, you know what? I'm gonna make her laugh tonight. You know what? Tonight I'm gonna tell us a couple stories that remind us why we love each other. Tonight we're gonna order that bottle of wine that means something to us tonight. You know, whatever it is for you that when you have a goal in an interaction with a person, it changes the relationship with that person, doesn't it? Well, same thing. New Year's, my friend. You got to set some goals for other people in your immediate circle. So when I'm thinking about building my team, I'm thinking about both hiring new people, but also building the people who are already there. Meaning how would you strengthen your team if you don't Have a team. How would you strengthen your spouse? How would you strengthen your child? How would you strengthen that friend that you always hang out with? Set some goals for them about how you can support them. Because you know what is the best feeling in the entire world? Supporting and cheering on other people. Because we've gotten a culture where people are just supporting and cheering on themselves, right? How they look on their Instagram feed, how they appear to the world versus how they can serve other people. And my hope for humanity is that we switch that mindset from selfishness to service, from selfies to service. How's that for a tagline? If we can just get back into thinking about, oh, this other person, what's their reality? What are their challenges? What do they need? What do they hope for? And how can I support that? Do you know the goals and dreams of the important people in your life? Do you know what they are? And of course not. We can't all. We can't know that of every single person, right, there's too many. Like, I can't possibly. I think about the number of people that I know, but what I have to have for me is that higher level of intention and goal for the people who are in my circle.

Does that make sense?

So I hope this is serving you guys. I think that can be, for a lot of you, a game changer when New Year's resolutions become also resolutions for the interactions you have with other people on how you can build other people. Now, I'm not trying to impose my goals on you here. I'm trying to just share maybe different ways of thinking about what you're already doing this year, which is your New Year's resolutions that you already have. I hope that somewhere in those resolutions, building other people up is a central theme that runs through all your relationships.